Talk of Customer-Supplier Partnerships and Proactivity

You’ve printed a few small jobs for me, and they look great. Everything went smoothly—you delivered on time and the invoices contained no surprises. I am confident in both you and your company.

Don’t sit back and rest on your commissions; your work is just beginning! Now that you know my work, offer me recommendations:

• Save me money. Can I resize my piece to better fit on the press sheet? How about another paper stock? If you do both digital vs offset printing, bring me some samples and tell me the price difference.
• Boost my sales. The USPS is offering a summer sale on pieces containing a QR code. I want you tell me how much it could save me in postage.
• Has another customer used a specific size, fold or variable design, which boosted their sales? Did I hear you recommend this to me?
• What if I were to get my internal schedules better aligned and print two pieces together instead of a week apart? Tell me about the advantages!

I depend on you to help me look better, gain more customers and save money. You may get slightly less money out of me in the short term, but you will gain more loyalty and more business in the long term.

I am proud to say that my local printers have done all of this for me, except the offset printing comparison because they work digitally. The guys down at Global Elements (www.theglobalelements.com) have saved my neck more times than I can count. I hope others are lucky enough to find a reliable printing company to work with.